The headline was clear. The accused had been convicted and the sentence was life. Galatians 2:20 is my life sentence. It acknowledges that “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.”

When you hear the phrase “life sentence” my guess is you think of the former and not the latter. You think of someone who has been judged to have committed so serious a crime that the only way for society to consider itself safe and for justice to be served is for the person to be condemned to spend the rest of their life in prison.

But there’s another kind of life sentence – the kind of life sentence of the Christian who knows that we’re already dead and already raised and the life we now live belongs to Christ to do with whatever He wants. The opposite of bondage, this life sentence is real freedom – no matter the circumstances of life. It is the secret of being truly free.